a raft of ducks
glides as a dense pack --
then one goes solo.
Duck Raft [Haiku]
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Category Archives: Poetry
Sunrise Fisher [Haiku]
weary fisherman
paddles sunrise-tinged lake
to cast nets.
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Hermit’s Face [Haiku]
hermit's face forms
amid river ripples:
fades like dream remnant.
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THAILAND LIMERICK
There was a wise pot seller in Thailand
whose customers always claimed to be scammed.
You see, he sold metal pots –
Ganja varietals, not –
but he truly had the strongest pot in the land.
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AUSTRIA LIMERICK
There once was a man from Austria
prone to coffee house nausea.
“Our cafés are held dear,
but I can’t go near…”
said that lonely, skinny man of Austria.
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BOOK: “Golden Treasury of Quatrains and Octaves” [i.e. 千家诗] Trans. by Xu Yuanchong and Xu Ming
Golden Treasury of Quatrains & Octaves by Xu. Yuanchong (translator)My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Publisher Site — China Translation Corp
This is the bilingual (Chinese-English) edition of an anthology of Tang and Song Dynasty poems commonly known in Chinese as 千家诗 (it has a much longer formal title,) which was jointly translated by Xu Yuanchong and Xu Ming (no relation.) The book is organized into four parts by the form of poem: 7-character line quatrains, 7-character line octaves, 5-character line quatrains, and 5-character line octaves. The anthology includes poems by Li Bai, Du Fu, Wang Wei, Meng Haoran, Jia Dao, Ouyang Xiu, Yang Wanli, Su Shi, and many other important Tang and Song poets — from Emperors to Hermits. That said, while the aforementioned Chinese title suggests there are works of a thousand poets involved, that’s an exaggeration. (And that’s probably all the better. While this was the golden age of Chinese poetry, going that wide into surviving poetry might involve hitting the dregs.)
Each entry has a title, byline, the poem in Simplified Chinese script and pinyin (Romanized phonetic script,) an English language translation, notes in Chinese, and a line or two of commentary in English. All but the seven-character line octaves take up just one page per poem. (Seven-character line octaves take two pages per poem.)
This is a great anthology. There’s an introduction to give insight into what approach the translators took. They stuck to rhyming verse to emulate the originals in form, but more can be learned from the introduction.
I’d highly recommend this anthology for poetry readers.
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Different Wavelengths [Lyric Poem]
The parrot stands, as if jilted.
The chipmunk sniffs, as if intrigued.
Parrot behaves ever so stilted.
Chipmunk is just hungry and fatigued.
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UNITED ARAB EMIRATES LIMERICK
There was a Bedouin from the UAE
who never in his life had seen a tree.
Walking through lands
of endless sands,
he had nothing to hide behind to take a pee.
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CAMBODIA LIMERICK
There was a Cambodian archaeologist
who dug up temples in jungles – get the gist.
But one day his dig,
under a Strangler Fig,
got him strangled… or so claimed the botanist.
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Weeds [Haiku]
summer grasses
wave atop a once mighty fort
that's gone to seed.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 